


Under Black and White Check

by ShiroHatzuki



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, HUGE SPOILERS, Mental Breakdown, Minor Character Death, Ouma's POV - Freeform, Spoilers, canon? in my story?, did i mention there are spoilers?, its more likely than you think, most of those characters up there are only mentioned or implied, ooc ouma (probably), ouma's the real focus of this story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2018-09-09
Packaged: 2019-07-08 15:52:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15933641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShiroHatzuki/pseuds/ShiroHatzuki
Summary: In the corner of an obscure room, Ouma discovered a chess set. From what he knew, none of his other classmates had found it yet, or if they did, they would not care for it. They definitely would not want to play with him. And yet, throughout the killing school life, he finds himself playing an odd game of chess with some mysterious person.





	Under Black and White Check

**Author's Note:**

> Can also be read on [tumblr](https://shiro-hatzuki.tumblr.com/post/177885786200/under-black-and-white-check)

[](https://imgur.com/0yInllh)

In the corner of an obscure room, Ouma found a chess set sitting on a small table. Upon closer inspection, the set was gaudy even for him, though it should have been expected, with the nature of the figurines he had seen earlier. The white pieces were carved to look like the white side of those weird, sentient teddy bears, and the pieces on the opposite side were of their colored side. The king pieces looked like a different sort of bear, however, and the piece on the black side were actually black with red eyes. All the pieces were set up in their beginning positions, waiting for two players to come along. If the it was not a huge reminder of his current neck pain, he may have been compelled to apologise to the chess set. It looked like he was the only one who had found the room thus far, and he already screwed up any chance he had of the others trusting him. No one would want to play chess with him, much less follow him to the back room. Not willingly, anyway. He moved one of the white pieces. Even though he would probably not be playing with anyone else for a while, perhaps he could still play against himself. It would not be as fun, but it was something. 

Just then, a bell rung. A school bell? Did they have different class periods in the run down school? He spun around at the sound of something buzzing to life to find that the monitor had turned on by itself. No, not by itself. On the screen were the five Monokubs, sitting on a hideous couch in an even gaudier room that had miniature dolls of all of the students strewn about. Of course they had control of the monitors.

The talking bears made their announcement to head to the gym for an opening ceremony. The very fact that they wanted all of them gathered in one place set off alarms in Ouma’s mind. It was not good news, but what happened if he did not comply? Everything about the school was suspicious, and so many places were blocked off. He had no clue what potential dangers could lurk behind the various locked doors, and he would not be the first victim of said dangers He would go to the gym, but stay near the exits.

Sucking up his growing fears, he left the room and headed for the gym.

-

Ouma found himself wandering the hallways. He had no idea why, even though he said he wanted to go back to his room. Well, he was a liar, so it was fine. He just walked around, hoping he would not run into any of the other students. He did something horrible to Akamatsu, but it was important. She was making the rest of their supposive “classmates” run a pointless obstacle course that had no end. The fact that she had such influence over the others was scary, dangerous even. For now, everyone needed to lose some of the tension they built up so they could all think clearly, especially Akamatsu. Once they did that, then they could find a way to escape. Still, did he overdo it? No, he definitely did. He let out a sigh. There was no taking it back now. He already established a horrible personality, and he had to stick with it.

“They’ll start hating me soon,” he concluded. That is, if they did not already.

The others aside, he should really focus on his surroundings more. Ouma focused his eyes on his location and found that he was in front of a door. Where was he? He opened the door to find that he had wandered to the room with the chess board he found the day before. Now why did he do that? He moved to the chess set and found, strangely, that something about it seemed… different. The piece he had moved previously was still where he had left it, but this time, one of the black -or rather, colored- pieces had changed position. He did not move it the last time he was there, did he? Unless…

He moved a white piece. If by some chance someone else had made a move, perhaps he was in the middle of a game with them. It was dangerous to go alone to an out of the way room on his own, and he had no idea if the person would come back to make another move, or if they did, maybe it was a trap. But something about playing a game of chess with this mysterious person was... thrilling. He would take his chances.

“Your move,” he muttered over his shoulder as he left the room.

-

Where was he going? It did not matter. He just… needed some time to himself. To think.

It should not have been surprising that he went back to that chess room. For the past few days, he had been doing so. Every once in a while, he would stop by the room throughout the day, though the other side made no movement until he came back the next day. Maybe they came to the room after the nighttime announcement. Regardless, he was certainly playing a game of chess with this person at this point.

He observed the board. Just before he reached the room earlier that day, Monokuma made an announcement for everyone to head to the library, so this was his first time seeing it that day. The other side definitely made a move, and yet, something was not right. Had the person moved more pieces than they should have? Of course they did. They were playing against a person that was not even in the same room as them. It made sense that they would want to cheat. No one wanted to play fair. Nothing was fair. Not life, not other people, not Monokuma, not Amami, not Akamatsu, not death. Since when did anything or anyone play fair?

Ouma let out a shaky breath. The killing game had already been started by the two people he expected wanted it the least. In this game of chess, he already lost a pawn and a rook. He could cheat as well, but that felt like giving up. He still had his honor, no matter what it may have seemed like to the others. He won chess games by playing fair in the past, and he would not throw in the towel now.

He moved a piece on his side. Even if he could not win against a cheat, he could still win in other ways, starting with the killing game. He would find a way to stop the killing game before it claimed any other lives. 

-

The other player had yet to cheat again after that one day. That was a relief, since Ouma already had enough to worry about with all of the work he was doing. He still had no idea who he was playing against, but that was not his main concern. Thanks to the idiocy of the other students, every plan he had of avoiding another death had been ruined, if the last class trial he walked out of was any evidence of that. If the others had just followed along with what he said, then Hoshi and Tojo would still be alive and all of the trouble they went through could have been avoided. But of course it did not turn out that way.

He knew he himself was partially to blame, though. Everyone thought of him as a liar and a trouble maker -the last kind of problem that they wanted to deal with. Maybe he could have slowly revealed his true intentions to the others, and maybe even put on a more trustable persona. But he could not. There was no way he could lay out so much of himself out for all to see. He had to stick with the “Ouma” that everyone knew.

The dictator shook his head as if it could shake the depressing thoughts out of his head. He just had to keep trying. Just go forward, and he could make things work out. Anyway, he still had to take his turn.

-

There was nothing he could do. Ouma told himself that over and over again. The entirety of the situation was too odd, too out of anyone’s but Shinguji’s control. But he could not ignore the fact that he let Yonaga’s little group run wild in hopes that it could actually distract everyone from murder. Why would something as stupid as that actually work? Not only that, but he ended up being used in part of Shinguji’s murder plot disguised as a stupid seance.

There was nothing he could do, he reminded himself. Shinguji was already insane before the killing game even started. The whole situation was a mess. There were not many alternative routes he could have taken to prevent those particular murders from happening. It was inevitable.

He turned his attention to the chess board in front of him. Even when the other side was not cheating, they were still a skilled player. Or maybe he was just doing worst. It would not have been surprising if this messed up school was getting to his head.

He took a deep breath. It was fine. All he needed to do was try a little harder. He needed to do something drastic. And most of all, he needed the others to cooperate with him. No matter what.

Even though no one trusted him, he would get them do do what he wanted. He was the Ultimate Dictator, after all.

His head ached. He rubbed his eyes in order to keep them focused on the board in front of him.  
_

Ouma trudged into the room. That was he had been doing after every class trial thus far, right? He visited every day, right?

The game was clear: he was losing. While he was now down to less than half of his pieces, he had barely made a dent in his opponent’s numbers in comparison. His king was too exposed. He had to play way too defensively for the past few days. This was not like him. He never lost this lamely.

He stared down at all of the white pieces that were no longer on the black and white board. And his legs gave out from under him.

He could not do anything for anyone. He could not stop himself from being attached to people. He could not stop from himself from manipulating others. He could not stop himself from hurting others. He could not stop lying. He could not be honest. He could not even win a stupid chess game. He could not, could not, could not, could not-

All of the tears he held back after Gokuhara’s execution would not stop pouring. He did not let them stop. Curled up on the floor, his body convulsed as he sobbed. He knew there were probably cameras watching him, mockingly watching him completely break apart.

“Does this satisfy you?” he shouted at the room through his blurred vision. “Do you get gratification seeing me an emotional mess?” His words sounded garbled in his ears, watered down by the raw emotion the strangled his chest until he was gasping for breath.

His stomach was churning. He felt sick. Ouma forced his arms to pick him up off the ground. His unsteady feet led him to the door. His shaking hands struggled to open the door, and his legs wobbled to the point that he was leaning on the door frame for support.

After what felt like hours, he managed to stumble out of the room and down the hall. He had to hold himself against the wall as he went. The world was spinning, spinning, blurring, warping. He could not make it far down the hallway before he had to keel over and released his stomach contents.

Once he was done retching up his guts, he carefully stood. God, his rancid vomit was all over the floor. He could not help but chuckle a bit. Serves this damn school right, he thought. If only the god awful taste would leave his mouth. Usually, he might have washed down the unpleasant flavor by washing it down with soda. Saihara once gave him a sweet drink. That was before he became the bad guy.

Exhausted, he made his way back to the room. Even though it was tough, his plan was still going along well, as unfortunate as it was. He gently shut the door behind him before wobbling over to the table. Even with so many of his pieces out of the picture, he could still proceed. He had been relying on his queen and one knight for the past few days. That knight was just taken out. Hopefully his opponent won't suspect his other knight.

“It's time to win this game.”

-

She ground her teeth together. To think that guy would sacrifice both of his knights in order to corner her with two pawns, a rook, and a queen. No matter what move she made, at least one of those pieces would get to her king. It was as good as checkmate.

She had no idea why she became so caught up with a chess game with the troublesome dictator in the first place. For the entire time, all of his moves were weird, unpredictable. Even when he was surely about to lose, he found a way to turn the game around to favor him. Truly, she made a force to be reckoned with.

With a frustrated huff, she flicked the top of the white king, toppling the small piece easily. Even when he was dead, she could almost imagine Ouma laughing at his victory, the smug jerk. Oh well. He may have won the chess match, but his main goal would never be achieved. The killing game will never die. Even when this game ended, the killing game would not.

“My Danganronpa will live on.”

**Author's Note:**

> I decided to watch some playthroughs of the ndrv3 class trials in order to stay as true to canon story line as I can for this story, and even though I know exactly what happens, I still friggin cried at the end of Kaede’s and Gonta's class trials. Screw you, ndrv3! I want my tears back!
> 
> So this fic was mainly just to test out putting a picture in a work. How did all of that angst happen, then? Well, one night when I should have been sleeping, I thought, "What if Ouma was actually sad about Gonta's death?" And that was the story of how I came to write this depressing garbage lol.
> 
> In order to make it up to Ouma, since I know he wouldn't like people to think of him as such a weak and pitiful boy, I set one of his weirdest sprites as my phone background for a while. The best part is that I have this duel clock function on my phone that compares the times of two cities, so I could have a really scary Ouma on my phone, but just swipe left and suddenly it's weird Ouma with giant analogue clocks for eyes lol.
> 
> Thanks for reading!!


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